John Dabiri, Assistant Professor of Aeronautics and Bioengineering, Beverley McKeon, Assistant Professor of Aeronautics, and Joel Tropp, Assistant Professor of Applied and Computational Mathematics, will be recieving the Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE) at a special White House ceremony in January 2010.

In a special White House ceremony, President Obama will be presenting three EAS faculty: John Dabiri, Assistant Professor of Aeronautics and Bioengineering, Beverley McKeon, Assistant Professor of Aeronautics, and Joel Tropp, Assistant Professor of Applied and Computational Mathematics, with the Presidential Early Career Awards for Scientists and Engineers (PECASE). "These extraordinarily gifted young scientists and engineers represent the best in our country," President Obama said. Dabiri,describes the idea behind his PECASE-winning research as "giving underwater vehicles the enhanced performance of fish (e.g. efficiency, stealth, and maneuverablity) without mimicking the shape and swimming motions of fish. Instead, we replicate the vortex dynamics in the wakes of swimming fish." His "bio-inspired systems" were used by Lydia Ruiz (PhD '09 Mechanical Engineering), to demonstrateincreases in vehicle propulsive efficiency of over 50 percent.

McKeon is receiving the PECASE for her research on fundamental questions in complex turbulent boundary layers. McKeon states that "the ultimate goal is to incorporate recent advances in the understanding of flow physics in order to develop low order models of flow over surfaces for Air Force applications". Tropp's PECASE-winning research "focuses on developing new algorithms for solving inverse problems, a basic challenge that arises throughout the mathematical sciences. Inverse problems also appear in medical imaging, in communication systems, in statistical data analysis, and a host of other areas." He uses tools from modern applied mathematics, such as optimization techniques and randomized algorithms to collect partial information about an object of interest, and incorporate additional background knowledge to develop a complete picture of the object.

Mani Chandy, Simon Ramo Professor and Professor of Computer Science, Mathieu Desbrun, Associate Professor of Computational Science and Engineering and Computer Science, and Joel Tropp, Assistant Professor of Applied and Computational Mathematics, have been recognized as exceptional teachers by the students at Caltech. Each has won a 2007-2008 ASCIT prize, awarded by the undergraduate Academics and Research Committee (ARC) and the Associated Students of the California Institute of Technology (ASCIT). This award is bestowed upon only five faculty members each year.

Two EAS faculty have won ONR Young Investigator Awards: John Dabiri, Assistant Professor of Aeronautics and Bioengineering, and Joel Tropp, Assistant Professor of Appliedand Computational Mathematics. The objectives of the Young Investigator Program are to attract to naval research outstanding new faculty members, to support their research, and to encourage their teaching and research careers. Tropp's award is for his research into "Compressive Signal Processing - Theory and Algorithms"; and Dabiri's award is for work in "Optimal Propulsion Methodologies for Hybrid Screw-based, Bio-inspired Systems". ONR announced 27 new awards for 2008.

Upcoming Events_

Alumni College: Caltech ComputesA day-long event that will explore the ways in which computational thinking is disrupting science and engineering, and creating entirely new disciplines with "CS+X".

TechFestA day-long event focused on providing startups and companies with a chance for meaningful interactions with undergraduate and graduate students, providing students with an opportunity to find out more about the breadth of applications for computing and mathematical sciences across industries

Past Events_

Meeting of the MindsA day-long research conference featuring talks, laboratory open houses, and poster presentations by distinguished faculty, advanced graduate students, undergraduates, and researchers from JPL showcasing the latest and most exciting work that is underway in CMS